Yankees' Gerrit Cole Exits vs. Dodgers with Cramps After Initial Injury Concerns

New York Yankees ace Gerrit Cole appears to have avoided the worst-case scenario after being pulled from Saturday's game against the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Cole was yanked from his start on Saturday after tossing just 80 pitches in six innings, which caused some concern among the New York fan base. However, insider Ken Rosenthal reported on the Fox broadcast that the veteran was pulled due to cramping.

Cole, 32, was superb in the 2021 season, going 16-8 with a 3.23 ERA, 1.06 WHIP and 243 strikeouts in 181.1 innings. Those numbers left the four-time All-Star as the runner-up in the American League Cy Young Award voting behind Toronto's Robbie Ray.

He followed that up with a 13-8 record in 2022, finishing with a 3.50 ERA, 1.01 WHIP and 257 strikeouts in 200.2 innings. That earned him his fifth All-Star bid.

He has mostly been as advertised since signing a nine-year, $324 million contract with the Yankees ahead of the 2020 season. In that COVID-19-shortened campaign, he went 7-3 with a 2.84 ERA, 0.96 WHIP and 94 strikeouts in 73 innings, finishing fourth in the Cy Young balloting behind Cleveland's Shane Bieber, Minnesota's Kenta Maeda and Toronto's Hyun Jin Ryu.

He's finished top-five in the Cy Young voting five times.

Entering Saturday's game, Cole had posted a 6-0 record in 2023 with a 2.93 ERA, 1.14 WHIP and 79 strikeouts in 73.2 innings across 12 starts.

Seeing as how he appears to be fine, Yankees fans can breathe a sigh of relief.